Once I get up from my bed I immediately summon Arn. I get the feeling that I was being watched the whole time I was sleeping that my body is reacting too wildly against it. I ready myself while Arn is being summoned as of now. When Arn gets out of his portal he asks me.
“Santi what’s happening? I’ve never seen you this agitated except when you chased down that murderer.”
“I don’t know Arn, my instincts are screaming that someone is hunting us at this point.” I hurry dressing up with my clothes and leather armor. I have a feeling we need to stay out of town for a while.”
“Wait, this might be the deshars that are wandering about that you told me yesterday. Your body is reactive to it because it senses more than what an average Quaraman should in the first place.”
“That just means they’re in town doing something and I’m not sure if I can take the pressure for a few days in the first place.”
“Fine fine let’s just get out of here if you want. Being the brat you are can’t stand something once it scares you to hell.”
I pack all the things I need for a job that’ll take me days to finish. I put my sword and dagger on my belt and make sure that I won’t be seen by anything when I’m walking around town. I do all of this as fast as I could while Arn accompanies me.
As soon as I’m finished packing, I go out the door and immediately go outside without informing the owner. I run as fast as I could going to the guild house without even looking at my surroundings as I dart through the ruins I feel comforted with for the past few years. Arn keeps up with me running through the ruined neighborhood as I pass some Zokun on the way there.
When I get into the city proper I try to make sure I walk as fast as I could without drawing attention to myself, blending in with people and making sure I’m as calm as they look. Keeping up with that facade is getting harder and harder as I keep walking to the guild itself.
What if they’re there already waiting for me? What would they do once they see me? So many questions are popping up in my head that I can’t think straight. At this point I might as well suffer headaches from magic usage as that’s a better alternative than whatever is happening to my head right now.
I’m not sure if I’m seeing correctly but the people around me are starting to get wary of me as they try to get away from me while I walk through them. At this point I didn’t care about that as I keep walking to the guild in the same manner I did earlier trying to bear the instinctive fear that my body is saying to me. Walking along the road made me feel that I am something to fear to the people around me like I’m a madman angry at something trying to chase it.
Once I get to the guild it seems that there are more people looking at it than usual but my senses tell me that the deshar are already there waiting. I get to an alleyway and climb the building to see the street in front of the guild. When I reached the rooftop that’s when I saw a dozen or two of people wearing hooded robes waiting in front of the guild.
Describing the scenery the mercenaries outside are scared shitless while they are trying to get inside the guild as well. The other people that see that just instinctively walk away from the whole thing and don't look back. The group is just there casually waiting with their thin arms and that is the moment I understood. These are the infamous deshar.
I tried to get down from the building but I feel a strong presence behind me, something so strong that I might die just from the pressure itself. I turn my back slowly and as I do so I see an incarnation of death itself, one of the hooded men was already behind me waiting for me to react to him. I gulp my saliva as he says something to me.
“You must be the one the priestess is looking for.” He says in a heavy tone. He continues saying to me.
“Stand up, the priestess has been waiting to meet you after our journey, We have already made arrangements to meet you inside the guild that you work for. Sorry for all the commotion we did for a few days but I hope you’ll forgive us. Now if you’ll come with me that will be best.”
He jumps down to the alleyway and waits there for me. In all my days that I have lived until now, I summon up all the courage that I have to move and follow him down to the alleyway. I jumped down from the roof I was on and immediately follow the man who scared me. Arn then talks to me telepathically.
“Well well well I would be damned that the Deshars were actually looking for you.”
“Don’t make this moment worse for me, it’s taking all of my willpower to follow this guy.”
“I can’t blame you for that since my first encounter with the Deshar back then was way worse than this.Although I think that guy saw me.”
I continue following the man until we get out into the streets as I see passerbys looking at us wondering. We walk until we get inside of the guild as several mercenaries look at us as we enter inside. What I do notice is that they notice the man beside me instead of me who feels like someone who is following the man. The Deshar mumbles to himself.
“I do remember the priestess telling me that we should have a meeting room upstairs where we could speak in private.”
He heads up the stairs and with every creak he makes, it feels like someone approaching you in the night to murder you. Every mercenary that can hear it feels sweaty and is already cowering in fear. We head up to the 3rd floor of the guild as I see the familiar hallway that I use whenever Veron asks a favor from me to do something for the city.
We walk to the farthest door to the right. I anticipate in fear of what is to come behind that door. I might have been in bad situations before but this is way too different to be a bad situation. The deshar says to me.
“The priestess is waiting, don't make her wait too long for you.” He bows to me as he opens the door.
All I see past the door is a conference table filled with chairs beside them. But the only thing in my mind right now is a small deshar in front of me. She sits comfortably still with her hood on so I can’t make any proper details about what she looks like and how her face reacts to me. She speaks in a high tone voice with a childish mannerism.
“Hello Santi, it's nice to meet you.”
She runs up to me like a little kid. Then when she gets near me she observes me out of curiosity. She's been observing me so intently that my body hair freezes so that it doesn’t even try to move anymore. The surprising thing that happens next is that she hugs me and all of my fear suddenly vanishes away.
Maybe it’s just a child’s innocence but it helps dissipate all the fear I had going through at this point. If you ask me, her thin arms grabbing around my waist makes me feel like I’m handling my own child. She then speaks to me.
“I’m glad Defari sended me to someone like you. You seem like a nice person aren’t you?” She smiles like it's that happiest day of her life.
I then look at her properly now that her hood goes down behind her back. Now that I can think properly I can see her thin head seems to comprise 3 blue eyes in front of her face with the 3rd eye on her forehead it seems. She has this long hair attaching to that head of hers. I mean she looks like an ordinary kid except with her 3rd eye.
Now that I notice everything about her body is way too thin than what normal Von seems to have. If you look at it they look humanoid but their bodies are way too thin that you can say they’re made out of sticks literally. I mean her skin looks like it belongs to a dead person especially.
“Priestess if you take too long hugging Santi here, he might wonder what is going on in the first place.” She let me go as she went back to her seat. Her eyes turn to red as she sits down.
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“Ehem, Santi you are here today because of a request of the Death god, Defari.” I gulp as she says that. I take a seat somewhat near to her so I can listen to her properly. She continues.
“Defari says to me in a dream that I should seek you, the one who is cursed, and don’t worry I know about your curse for some time.”
My heart beats up again from that phrase. I never told anyone about this although Veron might know about it but not the exact details. Arn told me back then that my curse is an imitation of a Deshar.
“I know that fighting like a Deshar has its pros but the consequences of the people back then trying to imitate it well… turned them into a bloodthirsty monster who hungers for death and battle.”
“How do you know about this?” I ask her.
“Well Defari talks to me through my dreams and we had 2 years worth of conversations to talk about it.”
For a priestess like her I could believe it to a certain extent but I don’t know why a god like Defari would even go to her in the first place. I mean normally all the gods in this world generally don’t care about what’s exactly happening here that they wouldn’t even appear in dreams in the first place. She interrupts my thoughts
“That’s right I forgot to introduce myself.” She stands up and makes a girlish bow.
“My name is Abae Quin, it’s a pleasure to meet you Santi.” She sits back on her seat and continues.
“Anyway straight to the request. Defari told me that I should be mentored by you whatever that means is up to you for that is my god’s wish.” Arn then talks to my mind.
“I think this might be a good idea for now if you ask me.”
“Why do you say so Arn?”
“Think about it this way, she’s a deshar and that means another deshar won’t take action against you if you were with her and besides you might learn a few things from her as well.”
Still another one? Something’s weird about this, 3 months after training Prina and I get another one out of nowhere and it’s a Deshar at that. I mean she doesn’t even look that old compared to the other dude beside me. I bet she's around 8 or 10 years old especially with her size and everything. I then tell her.
“You do know that I’m already training another one right? I’m not sure if I can take in another to mentor as well.”
“Well I have learned about her recently but I think it’ll be fine, just think of it as taking care of a highly capable child. Besides I don’t think Defari will tell me something that is not beneficial to our tribe.”
“You’re their priestess right? Are you sure you could go away from your tribe for a time?”
“We already have a few priests and priestesses in our tribe. They'll be fine without me besides they think it’s a learning experience rather than staying in our tribe most of the time not knowing how the world works. So are you okay with it?”
“Fine, I'll mentor you for as long as you want to.” I give in to her. Most of her arguments are good enough for me. I ask her one thing before finishing.
“Have you already made an application for being a mercenary yet? Because as you know I work as a mercenary and I can’t take someone outside of the guild’s jurisdiction.” She gives me a confused look
“I guess we already have our first order in business already. We can go to Veron to create your license at least.”
We both get out of our seats and as she walks towards I notice that she’s looking at Arn’s ethereal figure that wouldn’t be seen by normal eyes. The next she does is actually pet him saying.
“I’ve been holding back earlier but your doggie looks really cute you know.” At the moment she looks like she’s just petting and rubbing air but then Arn then says to my head.
“Santi you gotta stop her, I’m starting to like her tingly hands. I think I might sleep if she keeps doing this to me.” I do feel like he’s already panting for more rubs and pets but I gotta stop Abae before Arn comes out of his ethereal body and uses his physical body.
“Okay I think that’s enough for now Abae, Arn’s getting sleepy and I still need him for other things.”
“Awwww I still wanna pet the doggie more, but if you say so Santi.”
She stops petting Arn and Arn gives a sigh of relief once it ends. Abae gets up from the floor and follows me out of the door. When we get out the deshar the lead me here says.
“I believe this is where we part Priestess?”
“Yes Klaine. You can go to the others for the pilgrimage”
“Understood, we’ll come back for you when the time is right. And don’t forget to behave with Santi here.”
“Take care Klaine.”
As they say their goodbyes, we head for the upper floor to talk with Veron. She walks like a child excited for her new toy she just bought. I can’t really blame her if she wants to act like that for her age. I know from experience that it’s better to enjoy your childhood rather than experiencing something horrible.
The way she walks just endears me in a good way. That innocence she just brings when someone looks at her, and the smile she gives along the way. We reach the stairs and start heading upwards. I notice that when she tries to walk on the stairs itself it doesn’t make a creak with her step weirdly. Compared to when Klaine earlier when going up making those noises.
We get in front of the door of Veron’s office. I open the door and the scene I see is that Veron is getting mildly scared in his seat. He tells us.
“Oh it’s you Santi and the priestess of the deshars I see. Come in come in take a seat here.” He points to the seats in front of his desk. We get into our seats and he continues.
“I didn’t expect for the priestess to be coming back here again after she gave me a scare yesterday. I thought she’s done and done with just meeting you.” Abae says to him.
“I’m sorry for that guildmaster, it's our nature to scare people with just our presence.” I then say to him,
“Yeah Abae here is going to be a part of my group from today onwards and that I’ll mentor her in the process.”
“WhaT?!” He says in surprise then he continues.
“You’re gonna make her a part of your group??” I nod to him.
“Let me get this straight, a Deshar is going to be a part of your group so you can train her?”
“Yep that’s right, we just came here so you could make her papers so she could get her license.”
“So that's why you two are here. Since it’s you santi I’ll approve it, give me a day to make her papers and license so she could work with you.”
“Thanks Veron, I’ll treat you to something after this.”
“Sure sure, if that’s all you’re here for I suggest you guys to tour the whole town or give her some information on how things work around here.”
“Let’s go Abae.” I say to her. She nods as she follows me out of the door. I then ask her while we are walking in the hallway.
“So Abae about what you said to Veron earlier, the part where it’s in your nature that your presence can scare people.”
“Oh that? When Defari made us he made us into something akin as an incarnation of death right?”
“Yeah I do remember that part on how our world was created.”
“Our presence oozes death and that brings out the fear of the Von, especially since all living beings in their nature fear death.”
“But in the other Von, they don’t exactly feel the same way I did when I first met you people.”
“Oh that? That’s because your senses are way higher than the normal being, thus when you sense us, your fear goes overload especially when you see face to face and I’m sorry that happened to you. It’s not a pleasant being from the time I observed from other people when I was here.”
“That’s fine but what I don’t get is why am I fine as of now.”
“Simple I put a spell on you that you won’t fear death, it’s something available to us priests and priestesses of Defari. Although that only lasts when I deem it so. Since it’s you I might as well just leave it on there as of now.”
“I think it’s better if you take it off as soon as your tribe gets out of the city, I’d rather fear death.”
“If you say so.”
We continue onwards to our first stop. I need to introduce her to Prina since she’s going to be working with her for the next few months as well. It makes me wonder how Abae will see Prina though.
Before heading out of the street I put Abae’s hood to attract other people although I’m not sure how that helps since her presence makes it difficult for her. As we get to the ground floor I do notice that several people are looking at our direction. We try to hurry along as I go to Sylia first at her desk. I then tell her.
“Hey Sylia, if Prina comes in today can you tell her to meet me at her place in the library?”
“I’ll tell her if she comes by Santi.”
“Thanks Sylia, tell Prina that I need her there because something came up.”
“Sure sure. See you later.”
“See you later as well.”
As we say our goodbyes, me and Abae head out the door to go to Prina's house. It’s been almost a decade since I last lived there, but I don’t exactly have any good memories there. My only sole comfort was staying in the library and talking with Arn from time to time.
As we are walking to our destination it seems that my fear is right, there are many people who are looking at Abae right now. Well at least they won’t get scared that much if they don’t see what she is, they’re probably just wondering who that person is, and not wonder why her presence can give a frightening presence. Might as well take advantage and make sure people put their eyes only on her and don’t wonder who she is with in the first place.
Now that I think about it I can utilize that presence of hers in some jobs but I’m not sure if she’ll like the idea of being bait, I might as well ask her if I need it on a certain job. That reminds me I don’t know how she fights yet, and especially that she’s a deshar and deshars are well pretty much unknown on how they fight all you get is the aftermath.
We get to the barracks and see the familiar building up close. It hasn’t changed for me after all these years. The same rundown building looks but you know it isn’t in the first place. I’ve been hearing the sounds of spell firing off and wooden swords clashing just behind this building itself. Some people must have been practicing real hard lately that’s for sure.
“So what are we doing here Santi?” Abae asks me
“Oh we’re here to meet the other member of our group, she has been helpful in some of my jobs so it’ll be nice if you girls get along.”
“I can’t wait to meet her. I do hope she’s nice.”
We head inside of the building and see the entrance of what should have been a noble’s home. Nothing has changed. I didn’t expect much from a 10 year difference but I do hope they fix the lighting in this place, man they should put windows in this dark place. I tell Abae.
“Well we’re meeting her in the library so it’s going to be quiet until we meet her and besides it’s not like anyone is going to come here at this time of the day.” We head to the right hallway.
The light coming from the courtyard blinds me as we enter the hallway. This is why you put windows in the commons. The sun blinds you as you try to get to the cafeteria or the library.
I do observe that there are kids training in the courtyard. Some are training averagely, while some are working hard to get better. The spells they can make so far are weak enough that it wouldn’t hurt the other person if they get hit by it. They still have a long way to go in that department.
We stand in front of a familiar door. I open it and see the array of shelves lined up with books inside them. I tell Abae.
“I know a spot here that I think you might like Abae. Nobody will know you’re there in the first place but you do know everyone that comes in that door.”
“That’s great then, can you get me a story here please?”
“Since it’s you I might grab something from the shelves.
We continue talking like this until we get to my spot and wait for Prina patiently.